


It's Your Turn

by ASignificantWhisper



Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Anxiety, Bipolar Disorder, M/M, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-20
Updated: 2015-11-20
Packaged: 2018-05-02 13:15:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5249528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ASignificantWhisper/pseuds/ASignificantWhisper
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He never expected him to be here.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It's Your Turn

**Author's Note:**

> So, this is just something that came to me. I had the idea, but then with my mood I was feeling, I just found myself writing until I came up with.. well, this. I think I'll make a series out of, especially since I have more planned to continue from where I left off at the end of this. Let me know if you wanna see it continue? Also, brief warning that it's got a lot of anxiety TW. I hate the fact that Mickey got put in prison, but we're gonna witness it anyway, so writing something that turned out this way, it kind of eases the pain I feel a little. Does that even make sense? Anyways, yeah... Let me know what you think!

He sighs rather deeply, his form going slack for a brief second as he waits for the paperwork to be handed back to him. With a chicken scratch signature, Mickey picks up the plastic bag with his belongings, body buzzing when he's permitted through the gates and into the cold ass Illinois air. He didn't even want to have the confines of the long coat and hoodie sweatshirt, not after so long in that jumpsuit. But the frigid air reminds him, so he tugs his coat around him and the hoodie, his jeans feeling too tight for him. Everything seemed to be suffocating him, because now here he was.

Right here in the world again.

It was enough anxiety, relief, mixed emotions for Mickey to fish out that crinkled pack of reds, a desperation curling around his throat for that sweet nicotine relief. When he's got the cigarette between his lips, fingers fumbling in the plastic for his Zippo, he realizes that he didn't have any fucking idea who would be here to pick him up. When his lawyer had told him the charges were gone, the bail was paid in full, Mickey assumed that his brother Iggy or Svetlana had managed enough dough to spring him, despite the fishy circumstances of the charges being gone. He really had grown to respect his wife. They would never be best buddies, but Mickey wouldn't mind cracking open a bottle of Jack with her when he got home. Mutual ground. Friendship. Mickey appreciates it.

Mickey hadn't spoken to anyone since yesterday. Then this morning when he was working the dishes in the kitchen, he was taken into the office, lawyer there with discharge papers and a smile. Mickey wanted to roll his eyes at the suited fucker. How much could he get paid by being state appointed? But when Mickey found out he was going free, he didn't question anything. Too happy to leave that shit behind.

His curiosity is winding him up with each step he takes, the weird unknown gnawing at his insides. He was on edge after everything. Wound up. Tired. Ready to have a hot shower, get blasted off his ass, then hit wherever he ended up- to hibernate for a good forty-eight hours. Mickey gets the smoke lit, turning on his phone to make a call, hoping he still could.

And that's when he remembers. As his lock screen folds from the swipe of his thumb before he can stop it, Mickey is met with the home screen, those green eyes staring back at him from under those long lashes. Those defining features proportioned, carefree. That red hair peaking out from underneath the knit hat that clung to the ginger's head. Mickey feels the ground under his feet like a dead weight. Was he standing? What was standing?

His mouth goes dry, the cigarette too heavy between his lips all of a sudden. His chest protested, needing the air with defiant screams as Mickey forgets how to breathe. The Marlboro drops at Mickey's feet, the orange ashes scattering over the asphalt. Mickey watches them robotically, so utterly confused. His eyes scanning the inked words on his knuckles that were curled around his phone so tightly his fingertips were shaking across the screen, swiping everything every which way. He wants to shout when he swipes left, causing Ian's picture to be covered.

 

Don't take him away from me.

 

Mickey's tongue circles the roof of his mouth when his lungs close in on a painful sound that he didn't even know he could make, forcing it from his throat, shoving it.

 

Stop.

 

It's several moments that pass, Mickey remembering where he was, how he got here. That panic pushing itself down when Mickey finds the nerve to light another cigarette, sucking down too many hits to care about that ugly burning circulating from the nicotine buzz.

 

I didn't think this could happen again.

 

The panic attacks were nothing new to Mickey after meeting the green-eyed boy wonder that continued to tear him open, right here, a simple screen separating gazes. But months back, forever and a fucking day ago- the panic permanently set in. Closed off, caged. Worrying. Without.

 

Mickey couldn't do it the first few nights. Sleeping without.. him. The cold air, the smell. It wasn't right. It wasn't that aftershave, that detergent soaked into the sheets. And Mickey never woke up with his face buried into a pillow that, that aftershave clung to. Even after, when that feeling dulled, the fear of the place he was in, Mickey could never ease into sleep. He'd always told himself, why not? You were meant to end up here, Milkovich. But after he met.. him, Mickey had grown accustomed to thinking that three walls of cement and a wall of iron, it wasn't where he was supposed to be.

 

The circles under his eyes had became a cosmetic residence. So much so that those who visited learned to stop mentioning them. They knew why.

 

You're out of the shithole now. Calm yourself the fuck down, Mick. Mick. Fuck. He calls you.. he called you that.

 

Mickey pinches the bridge of his nose, trying to shut off his third person internal monologue.

 

Wipe your fuckin' eyes and don't do this here, man.

 

Mickey inhales a brisk rush of the evening air, forcing himself to keep walking, detaching himself from the picture to hit his dialpad, hoping whomever had sent his bail had the brains enough to actually let him know about it. He catches the voicemails. Old ones from Svet, insults from Iggy. Calls from Ball. The dates start to stack up.

 

Ah, there's one from yesterday. Mickey doesn't insult the guards he passes, keeping his head down.

Fuck this shit.

 

The message comes to life, a throaty cough that cleared their throat on the line, making Mickey roll his eyes, that is until he hears the voice on the other end. He stills, yet again forgetting where he was, the basic motor skills of walking.

 

Fuck your fucking effect on me. Don't you dare, bitch.

 

"Hey, Mick." the voice greets on the other end. And Mickey hates the way it chains itself to him, dragging his heart down through his lungs, ping ponging back and forth through his rib cage, shooting up through his body so damn hard, ripping itself up through his throat, slicing off his speech capabilities, residing there. The metaphor or such was the only way it felt to Mickey. As if his anatomy could come apart and rearrange itself because of Ian Gallagher.

 

Ian fucking Gallagher.

 

Mickey hates that he can't keep his promise to himself to delete any contact with Ian, to end this message now before it started again. Before he fell apart in front of the guards. His knees hurt from trying to keep himself upright. His stomach hurt. But Mickey continues to listen, eyes wide, alert.

 

"I'm the last person you're gonna want to hear from right now, I know. If I know you.. You were probably expecting this to come from somebody else who isn't me."

 

Do you know me like you think you do? Or am I still Southside trash? Fuck you. Close the goddamned phone, shatter the fucking thing. Fuck him. Drama queen. Fuck this. Fuck him. Fuck this. Fuck everything right now.

 

"But it's me. So here I am. Well, not here. But you know. Nor there. Shit, that sounds stupid, doesn't it?"

 

You corny piece of red-headed shit.

 

"I could tell you a joke, but all I want to know is if you're okay?"

 

Fuck you. Strike that question from your freckled mouth entirely.

 

"You know they put in a Sizzlers down the freeway?"

 

Break. The. Goddamned. Phone. Go. Ring. His. Neck.

 

It hurt, that was a low smack. A Sizzlers? Down the road from prison? Was Gallagher fucking serious? Mickey felt his grip get slightly heavier, his knuckles turning white.

 

In through your nose, and out through the mouth. Fuck him. Breathe, Milkovich.

 

His eyes started to glaze over, vision becoming hazy with the forecast of the fucking moisture. It burns as it pools in like it often did. Mickey greets it with a violent swipe of his coat sleeve, smearing away the evidence.

 

"I know that you think I was the smart, that I was so fucking smart. But the truth is, I've never had my shit together. Not since I met you."

 

Taunt me, go ahead, Gallagher. Fucking prick. Tell me I ruined you. Tell me that I made you want to drown yourself in your sickness. Just do it. I know it. You know it. Do it.

 

"When I met you, you changed the direction of my life. Fuck, I thought my gene pool did that. But it was you. Everything was different when I met you."

 

Yeah, you and me both, pal. Again, go fuck yourself.

 

"I just didn't know it yet. I don't think I've ever said this to you. What you did for me, not just to me. No one..."

 

Mickey sways when he hears the line shuffle, leaning in to the phone as if he'd loose the message any minute.

 

"No one ever looked at me like you did. No one ever looked at me like a man, Mick. Not until you. You made a goddamn man out of me."

 

Ian, please stop.

 

"Things you did for me, for us. The things we went through... I never knew why someone looked at another person in a certain way. Not until I looked at you, and then you were looking back when I never expected it."

 

Mickey is frozen to the spot, the breeze could knock him off his feet if it hit him hard enough.

 

"But you started looking at me a different way after I got sick. And it scared me that I could make you look that afraid. It fucking hurt me. Because you spent your entire life being scared. And you shouldn't have to feel scared with me. You shouldn't have to be afraid for your son. You wanted to be free, Mick. You worked so hard for it."

"I pushed it. You said you were free with me. Until I got sick. How could I do that to you? You wouldn't be free anymore. It would be pills, fights, worry. All chaining you down. I would've chained you down. I couldn't let you be trapped with me. But then Sammi, and I broke you. "

 

Yeah, you proud of that? Badge of honor that you made a bitch outta me, huh?

 

"I didn't mean to, Mickey. I just wanted you to be free. But then look what happened. It's my fault. God, I can't take it back, I can't take any of it back. All I can say now is the only three words that I've needed to say, that I've said to you in a thousand unsent letters, in my head almost everyday after I met you. I--"

 

No. Fuck. No.

 

The automated message indicates that's the end of the message, and Mickey is manically shaking his phone, willing it back on. But then he practically laughs out loud.

 

Nah. He couldn't say it, could he? Chicken shit out. Had enough fun with his therapy session-phone confession time. Dangle Mickey around like a mouse.

 

Mickey notices he was being buzzed out of the gates now, down the pathway, and right to the pick up drive. But all he can really notice is that his mouth remembers how to form words again, and lets out a big "FUCK. YOU."

 

"I LOVE you."

 

Wait, what?

 

When Mickey looks up, he's met with the body that matched the voice. There, leaning against a glossy black Pontiac car, one large boot covered foot crossed over the other, the tall red head is clad in dark blue jeans, a tight fitted, long sleeved black t-shirt that dipped into a v-neck, permitting the red patch of hair to dip out of the top of the collar. He catches the enriching pink clouds signaling sunset, coating the cream colored sky behind them, illuminating the firey red hair and silhouette in a manner that made him want to kick himself for the way it stole his breath.

 

Somehow, he manages, the words spilling out of him in a voice so beat down, so low, disbelieving, he wasn't sure if any of this were real. "Ian?"


End file.
